Plain-English guide
What is SEO?
No jargon, we promise.
“SEO” just means getting your business found on Google when people search for what you do. Here's how it actually works — explained the way we wish someone had explained it to us.
Start here
Four numbers, and they form a funnel.
Picture Google's results as a shelf. Someone searches, Google puts pages on the shelf, and the question is: did they see you, and did they grab you? These four numbers answer that.
Impressions
How many times your site showed up in someone's search results — even if it was near the bottom. You were on the shelf.
Position
Your average rank when you showed up. Position 1 is the top result. Google shows ~10 per page, so 15 means page 2. Lower is better — this is the number that matters most.
Clicks
How many people actually clicked through to your site. The thing you ultimately want more of.
CTR (click-through rate)
Clicks ÷ impressions. Of everyone who saw you in the results, the share who clicked. It tells you how compelling your listing is.
The chain: shown (impression) → ranked somewhere(position) → if it's high enough and appealing, clicked— and CTR measures how good you are at turning “shown” into “clicked.”
The big one
Position is everything.
Where you rank decides whether anyone clicks. Roughly how clicks fall off as you drop down the results:
Same website, wildly different results — purely because of where you rank. Being on page 2 means almost nobody sees you.
The insight that matters most
Two kinds of searches.
Branded
People typing your name(“Joe's Plumbing”). You'll almost always rank #1 for these — but these people already know you.That's your reputation working, not new business.
Non-branded
People typing the service(“emergency plumber near me”). These are strangers who've never heard of you — in other words, new customers. Ranking for these is the entire point of SEO.
So what is “doing SEO”?
Pulling two levers.
Lever 01 · Slow
Rank higher
Earn a better position for the searches strangers actually type. Built with strong, relevant pages, genuinely useful content, links from other sites, and a fast, healthy website. Takes months — but it compounds.
Lever 02 · Fast
Earn more clicks where you already rank
Rewrite the title and description Google shows for pages that already rank but don't get clicked. Same position, more clicks — often in a matter of days.
And for a local business, there's a third piece that's often bigger than the website itself: your Google Business Profileand reviews — what shows up in the map when someone searches “near me.”
FAQ
Quick answers.
- What's the difference between clicks and impressions?
- An impression is every time your site shows up in someone's search results — even unseen at the bottom of the page. A click is when they actually visit your site. You can have thousands of impressions and few clicks if you rank too low.
- What does 'position' mean?
- It's your average ranking in Google's results. Position 1 is the top result. Since Google shows about 10 results per page, position 11–20 is page 2, and so on. Lower numbers are better, and ranking on page 1 is the difference between getting found and being invisible.
- How long does SEO take?
- Ranking improvements are gradual — typically a few months — because Google rewards sites it has learned to trust. Some wins (like rewriting page titles to earn more clicks at your current rank) happen in days.
- What's the difference between SEO and ads?
- SEO earns your spot in the regular ('organic') results over time and keeps working without paying per click. Ads buy placement instantly but stop the moment you stop paying. Most businesses use both — ads for immediate visibility, SEO for durable growth.
Want this done for you?
We do this for Newnan businesses.
We'll show you exactly where you stand and the quickest wins — free, no obligation. Same work we do on our own shop.